The Emco Maximat V13 was a very well made, all-geared head lathe that was supplied with a hardened bed as standard. It was probably the largest conventional centre lathe ever made by Emco Maier & Company and offered a remarkable amount of capacity in a very compact assembly. The electrical controls were to a much higher industrial specification than the company's other offerings with the motor control switch working through a traditional and very safe "third-shaft" and mounted at the lower right-hand side of the apron within easy reach of the operator in any normal working position. The lathe had a centre height of 165 mm (6.5") and a standard bed length of  850 mm (33.5") or 1000 mm (39.4") for the long-bed version. The hole through the headstock spindle was 36 mm (1.4") in diameter and the standard-fit two-speed 1.7/2.2 kW (2.3/3.0 h.p.) motor drove through a Poly-V belt to give a total of 16 speeds from 30 to 2500 rpm. The tailstock taper was 3 Morse taper and the barrel had a travel of 100 mm (4").
The screwcutting gearbox was totally enclosed, ran in an oil bath and transmitted power to the feed shaft through a slipping clutch designed to prevent damage in the case of mishandling by the operator; Emco also claimed that this feature allowed turning up to a dead point. In normal use the leadscrew, driven by a dog clutch, was used only for cutting threads and was otherwise left stationary. 28 metric threads were available from the screwcutting gearbox spanning 0.4 to 7 mm whilst the Imperial version provided 24 inch pitches from 4 to 56 t.p.i. An optional changewheel set converted both metric and Imperial machines to translate the other's threads - and also allowed 28 module pitches from 0.2 to 3.5 and 32 diametral pitches from 8 to 112 DP to be generated.
The stand was especially well constructed and came as standard with a useful slide-out chip tray and a generously proportioned splash back. As an option the Emco 6-speed milling head with fine and quick-action drilling feeds could be mounted and came complete with a usefully-large T-slotted boring table; a special vice was available to make the most of this table and Emco also offered a well-thought-out range of other milling accessories.
The machine was inspected to DIN 8606 standard but an option open to purchases was to have it delivered to DIN 8605 "toolroom-lathe accuracy". This did not, of course, change the machine into a traditional and genuine toolroom lathe; for that it would have needed to weigh at least twice its stated 550 kg and be of a very different design..